or stop cymbalta. dizziness or fainting may occur upon standing. take the next step. talk to your doctor. cymbalta can help. your soups are so awesomely delicious my husband and i can't stop eating 'em! what's...that... on your head? can curlers! tomato basil, potato with bacon... we've got a lot of empty cans. [ male announcer ] progresso. you gotta taste this soup. at the top of the show we asked you why you were awake. john tower? >> this is really distracting, by the way.

enjoy the music while i read this e-mail. i'm in north dakota at a drilling site. snow in new york? big deal, bill. we were negative 46. >> give it a half hour in new york to see what it looks like. next? >> here we go. george writes, welcome to dogs. dogs barking of "the addams family." ♪ the addams family that's the reason why we should practice these things. great show, everybody. "morning joe" starts right now. i know that some of you who are incredibly concerned about my weight. and i appreciate your concern.

anyone who has struggled with their weight over time in this state or in this country will tell you that when they begin the plan, they have every intention of fulfilling the plan. and so the plan which i begin today, i have every intention of fulfilling. i hope i can fulfill it by tonight. and then if i can, then tomorrow i'll start it and we'll go again. but i'm not -- i'm not going to be overly self-consumed about this. and nor should the people of the state be all that concerned about whether i can do my job. i can get out of bed every morning. >> all right. >> okay. good morning, everyone. >> how about that? >> they keep on asking him that. >> what do you think about that? >> welcome to "morning joe." >> what do you think about that? >> i think it's a little late to be asking him about his weight as if it's a big, huge issue that we don't know anything about. no, they have a former white house doctor commenting on his

weight saying he's going to drop dead in office. ridiculous. >> you know what, though, his own doctor, he admitted yesterday in this press conference said that he was worried about chris christie's weight and said that his luck was going to run out soon. >> so what's breaking news about this? >> i don't know. why do you have to be such a scold? >> i'm not a scold. i like him a lot. i think he represents a problem millions upon millions are facing. >> what, that he's a republican? >> anyone watching that sound bite or anything else understands that it is almost an impossible journey to take the road back from obesity and that he will do it, but it will be a very, very long haul. >> you've got a good friend that's doing it. >> i have a good friend who's doing it. we're writing a book together. >> 75 pounds. >> it's amazing what she has gone through to get there. and i wouldn't even begin to judge him. and quite frankly in terms of his ability to do office, take a look at what he's done and make your decision. i don't get it.

>> really? >> what am i missing, mark mckinnon? >> willie geist. >> modern culture. >> obsession. yeah. i kind of felt bad for him. >> willie, you see this, like, lance armstrong quote, he's not going to give back any of his money? is this guy -- i'm just curious -- is lance armstrong perhaps the biggest jerk in american sporting history? i mean, he says i'm not -- >> ty cobb is up there. >> i'm not going to give back any of my money, the bonuses. you know, we taxpayers paid him through the u.s. postal service. >> which on its face is absurd. the fact that a bankrupt agency is sponsoring him. >> livestrong, and he's getting millions and millions of dollars. i understand there's an investigation that's going to be launched against him, but why doesn't he give that money back to the people whose lives he tried to destroy when they tried to tell him the truth?

this guy is such a jerk. >> this wouldn't just be the right thing to do, it would be a good pr move if he's interested in rebuilding his image to give a little of the money back to some of those people. you mentioned there's a federal investigation we just learned about. drug distribution, fraud and conspiracy charges are going to be brought against lance armstrong. >> witness tampering, intimidation. really quickly one other sports story because i know mika loves talking about sport. sportball, as mitt romney would call it. this ryan braun guy, mvp, right, a couple years ago. he keeps getting, like, busted. he's got good lawyers, i guess, and now he's on this miami list. >> yeah. >> not looking good. >> he vaguely admitted that he had done some business, perhaps, with this group in miami that's now under investigation, under suspicion for having connections to other guys in major league baseball. he was cleared in the last one. you know, he was -- >> he's got good lawyers.

>> he was an mvp, a great player for the brewers. he was on an original list, but he was cleared. >> you know who else is on that list? mika brzezinski. are you still 'roided out? >> i didn't get to the complete story. his lawyer released a comment. >> what is it? >> would you like to read it? >> yes, i would. that would be amazing to actually -- >> through your 'roid rage. >> fully discuss something. it's a "washington post" story. his lawyer says he doesn't see any merit in the lawsuit saying my only point is no athlete ever to my understanding has ever gone back and paid back his compensation, not new orleans saints coach sean payton or anyone else. they were suspended, but nobody said you've got to give your paycheck back. >> wow. just classless. >> i'm pretty close to this issue. i serve on the board of livestrong. and i believe that lance has to get to a place where he has to serve a cause greater than himself. and i don't think he's there

yet. >> he can't do that. >> well, he's got to at some point. >> it goes against everything that he is and that he has been. can i ask you really quickly, mika, one other thing, too? i saw something -- and i don't know if it was actually in "the washington post" or if it was just online. i was blown away that "the washington post" published a story regarding michelle obama, the first lady's physique and that they did this because of something that a high school football coach said in a small alabama town. that was their excuse for doing the story. >> oh, right. i just thought it was way out of line. >> that's a poor excuse because i believe whoever made the comments was just some random person. >> it was a random high school football coach in a small town. and he said it in private, willie. and suddenly "the washington post" is using this as an excuse

to talk about the first lady's, as they said, derriere, posterior? "the washington post," really? you go to a small town in alabama with a high school football coach who makes a statement in private, and this is your lead? i don't even talk about the story if you can even call it that. let's jaus talk about the standards, willie, of "the washington post." what was that about? >> that's an odd peg to a story. that was a recorded coach in a locker room, one of the kids in the locker room recorded him saying some pretty terrible things about michelle obama including talking about her rear end. if that really was the impetus for "the washington post" story, it's pretty confusing to me. >> "the washington post" doesn't have a lot to write about, i guess. >> there's not a lot going on. >> no. we find out that the united states government now thinks it has the right to kill american citizens without due process or without probable cause or without any evidence. >> economic calamity at hand. >> by the way, i want to get to

all the news stories. i've got to ask mark mckinnon this story. barack obama, he'll sign, like, some regulation that will say that a federal agent can go pick up a tumbleweed off the side of the road in a deserted road somewhere in middle america. and republicans will stream to the floor and they'll scream, tonight, freedom was destroyed. how many times have you heard that? barack obama has destroyed freedom. tonight, you know, obamacare. they say barack obama has destroyed -- tonight freedom died. that's what we always hear from these republicans in the house. and here you have something truly chilling. here you have the united states government saying we can kill you, american citizen. you have no constitutional right to a jury by your peers. you have no constitutional right

even to probable cause or to due process. you have no right to a lawyer. you have no right to counsel. you have no right to anything. if we suspect you, just suspect you without evidence that you were thinking about committing an act against the united states of america, we can kill you. and we have no -- there are no checks, and there are no balances. we can kill you. we can pick you out of a list and drop a bomb on you. not only can we kill you, we can then kill your 16-year-old son who's not even affiliated with al qaeda. and then we can blame it on the father for us having to kill the son. that seems to me to be something republicans might perhaps be concerned about, go to the floor about and talk about. they talk about all these other insane things where they say freedom's dying tonight. no, this is a great example of where the constitution is being

stretched well beyond its limits. >> well, forget republicans. how about liberals and democrats? i mean, can you imagine if george w. bush had proposed this idea? >> of course. that's obvious. >> i'm a little contrarian with you on this. i agree with the policy. i think it's a good idea. >> you think it's possible to kill americans without probable cause? >> thinking about the threats against us and the machiavellian plots, i'm willing to err on the side of giving government a little bit of latitude. >> americans don't have a constitution -- this kid, the 16-year-old kid, goes out to a restaurant and gets killed. >> i understand. >> because of his father. >> i'm sure i'm in the minority of the stable, maybe in america. >> that causes you no concern? >> as i said, joe -- >> constitutionally? >> really? >> i err on the side of giving the government latitude on this one. >> we have katty kay with us as well from washington. i didn't get to do the intros. good morning, katty. >> morning, mika. >> you want to chime in on

drones? are you with mark mckinnon? >> i think there has to be a whole lot more open discussion of the kind -- we tried to raise a couple years ago, roy blunt tried to raise it in the petraeus hearings and was sort of smacked down by dianne feinstein. but now it's out there so much that the secrecy element is gone, and i think there has to be a real discussion both about the constitutionality particularly when it comes to american citizens but also the wider ramifications of whether this is actually serving our national security cause. because whilst you're taking out some al qaeda leaders, you're causing huge amounts of resentments in some of these areas and possibly fueling the next generation of militants in places like yemen and the pakistani borders, if we extend it into somalia or mali, there are a whole lot of people who are going to feel extremely angry about missiles raining down out of the sky and taking down people not always associated with terrorism. there's a story in "the new york times" this morning of an imam

who spoke out against al qaeda. operatives came to speak to him. as they were speaking under a tree to threaten him, missiles came down and took them out. what does that do in that community in terms of a sense of what america is doing, anger towards america and the fueling of more people who feel they want to join the cause of jihad? >> and the probable cause, by the way, jon meacham, now is -- and it really is -- if you're a man between certain ages and you are within the proximity of members who are suspected to be members of al qaeda, you are presumed guilty and they kill you. you're in the kill zone. >> i would be an imminent threat. you're presumed to be that. >> yeah. >> you know, the rule of law here, katty and i always joke about how she feels about losing the colonies. >> she's not happy. >> still mad. >> i don't think she's as grateful as she should be that we've allowed her to come back. >> exactly. >> this is one of the reasons we broke away from her crowd, was

that there were -- >> i don't see where this is going. i'm struggling with this one, jon. >> that the rule of law could not simply be in the hands of the king and could not be arbitrarily applied. and that's precisely what this is, is in the hands of an american king. >> and an american king that actually gets the list of people who he decides should be killed and who should not be killed. and "the new york times" reports that he goes down that list. and there's so many things that are chilling here. i do got to say, mika, again, just to follow up on what mark mckinnon said, this is one of those times where you can't even say if george bush were doing this because if george bush were doing this, everything that was going on in washington, d.c., would stop today. >> yes. >> there would be congressional hearings called. there would be articles of impeachment. all of washington, all of manhattan, the entire press corps would stop and focus its

attention on this unprecedented overreach, constitutional overreach. >> well, i think some of it will come out in the brennan testimony, and that should be very, very interesting. i think we made the point yesterday that if this was happening in the bush administration, people would be going crazy especially in the sort of echo chamber. but i do think, when you think through the debate on this and the debate you and i would have on this, we would end up exactly where we are on the debate about torture. where we both end up evolving a little bit because we both love this country. we both want to respect the moral values that it's pinned upon, but we also both want our children to be safe. >> right. >> i mean, i think that the debate would sound the same. >> it's a balancing act. i am surprised -- and willie, let me bring you in here because we went through this a lot, talking about enhanced interrogation techniques. and pretty soon even sleep deprivation and things that are done to u.s. soldiers in basic

training started being defined as torture. so i'm going to say enhanced interrogation techniques. i never could have imagined, under george w. bush and dick cheney's leadership, that it would devolve this far. as i said, i was upset after reading "the new york times" article about how long padilla had been incarcerated without seeing an american lawyer. i mean, some things just aren't right. and this just doesn't seem to be right. >> well, i said it yesterday. i'll say it again. i have a big problem with people being held at guantanamo bay without charge for years and now decade. but i have a bigger problem with people who are being killed without charge in the field of battle. so if you're outraged about enhanced interrogation, man, you should be really outraged about somebody being killed on the spot on suspicion of being a terrorist. and a lot of this is a semantic question. if you read that memo, the word

"imminent" is used a lot. what does it mean exactly? how do we know that this person is intimately involved in something that is intimate? also, the term "senior, operative." when we hear these come down and they come across the a.p. water, we ought to start using a little more scrutiny and ask, what does that mean exactly? what does it mean that the guy you killed is a senior al qaeda operative? how do we know he's senior? an operative? al qaeda? there are more questions that should be asked. >> so you're right, hold somebody at gitmo without charges. that's one level here. you kill somebody without probable cause or evidence, that's right there. and then you make it an american citizen who is protected by the united states constitution? jon meacham, and suddenly that raises it to an entirely new level. the u.s. government can decide which american citizens it's going to kill without probable cause, that is frightening.

and, of course, the next step is, the killings start taking place on american soil. >> sure. >> and we're not far from that. >> i think i said this yesterday. i think this is the ultimate manifestation of this blending of law enforcement and warfare that was thrust upon us by the attacks of september 11th, 10, 12 years ago. they're now so intertwined, it's almost impossible to pull them back apart. and one thing i think we have to be wary of is the history of executive power in the country bounces from one extreme to the other. we almost always overreact. so you don't want to get too much oversight and too complex about it because presidents know, there is a need to be able to strike. but i would love to hear what the debate on this was. >> and also, i want to get to a couple more stories before we go to break, but how history will

look at this will be so interesting because it might be the bush administration policies from wiretapping to gitmo to torture that led to information that led to what's happening here. i mean, it all will be related at some point. and the debate will be complete i muddled. and it's the debate we were having before president obama went into office. everything that you predicted has come to pass. and more. >> and more, exactly. other news. a new government report predicts the budget deficit will drop below $1 trillion for the first time during obama's presidency. the congressional budget office which assumes that federal spending cuts will go into effect march 1st says the government will run a deficit of $845 billion this year compared to last year's $1.1 trillion shortfall. but the cbo's ten-year outlook predicts those improvements will not last. it warns that an aging population will drive up entitlement spending and rising interest rates will put the debt at unsustainable levels. if current laws remain in place,

debt by 2023 only ten years from now will equal 77% of gdp. that's roughly double the 39% average seen over the past 40 years. and president obama is asking lawmakers to take quick action as a march 1st deadline approaches that will trigger deep spending cuts. "the new york times" writes this morning that "mr. obama, who missed a deadline this week to submit his annual budget to congress, acknowledged on tuesday that a broader deficit agreement is unlikely to be reached by the march deadline. he provided no details about the tens of billions of dollars in spending cuts and tax adjustments that he wants congress to pass quickly. more specifics could come when he delivers his state of the union address next tuesday." with nearly $1 trillion of domestic and defense spending hanging in the balance, the president says the impacts are already being felt. >> they're never -- there are never -- >> we're not going to run it. okay, go ahead.

>> -- there are never specific spending cuts. democrats never provide specific spending cuts. democrats -- alex, i'm just curious, how long has it been since democrats have passed a budget in the senate? watch this. watch this. >> 1,379 days. >> where's the full screen? i thought we had a full screen. >> since before the ipad. >> since before the ipad, exactly. no labels, nonpartisan group, of course, has this no -- >> no budget, no pay, which was signed into law by the president yesterday, for this particular bridge on the debt ceiling, but we need to apply it to the broader budget and appropriations process. >> and the thing is, it's just -- democrats haven't produced a budget in the senate. they haven't voted for any of the president's own budget. there's the full screen now. >> you were in congress. budget sets policy, right? you don't have a budget, you don't have policy. >> that's what i don't understand because you get there in january. you get sworn in. and you know what the first four months are? battles over what's going to be in the budget. because you know when that

budget falls in april, that's going to define who you are as a party, who you are as a congress, and who i am as an individual member whether i vote for that budget or vote against that budget. the fact that harry reid's senate and that harry reid himself has gotten in the way of a former really good budget chairman not passing a budget is shameful. and now you have the president saying, well, i'm against the sequester cuts. well, okay, great. what are you going to replace them with? i don't know. no specifics. they never give specifics. >> so i don't know, because i was working on my column and talking to a couple different people in the white house yesterday. and they were talking about the president's statement yesterday. and he is saying to republicans, come meet with him. anytime. they can come right now. and he will work on a deal. it can be a smaller deal if we can't make the sequestration deadline. and it can involve spending and revenue and a mix, and that they

haven't taken their toys and walked away. they've offered $400 billion in health care cuts and other things. the republicans have other ideas, come on over to the white house. put them on the table. let's make a small deal. if we can't get to a big deal, he would like to get to a big deal. and he's invited them over. anytime. >> so he wants them to come over -- >> what are their cuts? >> paul ryan put a budget -- >> why doesn't he go to the white house and work on it? >> -- put on a budget, and democrats absolutely savaged him for two nonstop years. while democrats haven't put forward a single proposal to cut spending. >> why don't they work together on the cuts? >> because. because the democrats don't make specific cuts. what the democrats do is they lure republicans in to make cut recommendations like paul ryan did. and then they start putting press releases out saying that they hate old people. that they hate little children. that they hate big bird. >> before they even go to the white house. >> it's indefensible what the

democrats have been doing. >> isn't one contribution being our talking about it not in terms of spending cuts because discretionary -- nondefense discretionary spending, as we know, is not so small. >> 12% of the budget. >> 12%. so we think about spending cuts, oh, we're going to cut that bridge. that's just -- it's just -- it's not where the ducks are. >> it's stupid, right. >> this is middle-class entitlement reform and health care spending reform. those are the two things. it's actually a slightly different intellectual exercise than going line by line and cutting programs. that's not what this is. it's got to be raising retirement ages, raising deductibles on health care. that's where -- >> they're invited to talk about it. >> that's where it is. >> which is, katty, why we have such silly debates over spending cuts and tax reform because the money is in long-term entitlement reform. and neither party wants to talk about it. >> right. i mean, you're right, joe, for

criticizing democrats for not coming up with big spending cuts, but look what happened during the presidential election campaign. the republicans backed away from paul ryan's spending cuts. so actually, when it comes to it, neither party wants to suggest the kind of changes to america's health care system that will have to kick in in 20 years' time when the vast majority of the baby boomers start hitting 70, get sick. it's going to cost a heck of a lot more if we want to keep them healthy in the way that we're doing now. and you're not seeing that debate. you're not seeing the proposals coming from either side about how to really address that because the truth is, either you're going to have to trim the quality of care every you're going to have to raise more revenue. there's going to have to be, at some point, you can make efficiencies, but at some point we're going to have to go to the system and say we cannot continue to have doctors and hospitals paid for service. it doesn't make sense because people are racking up too many services. >> they have to do it together. >> a whole psychology that has

to happen together, and both sides need the political cover from the other. >> by the way, i'll say this. on wednesday, february 6th, 2013, at 6:24 a.m., we'll have to do it all. you can shoot the messenger if you want, but beneficiaries are going to get less. providers are going to get less. revenues are going to have to be raised. we're going to have to start rewarding people based on results and not just services. all of these, everybody is going to have to give. and these people running around saying, look, you know the beneficiaries, we're not going to have to touch them? all you're going to do -- and zeke emanuel agrees with me -- is create a two-class system where middle-class to upper middle-class americans are going to opt out of medicare because the doctors aren't going to be reimbursed. and then you're going to basically have medicaid for people under 65 and medicaid for people over 65. >> so that's the long-term vision in terms of what needs to be done. and i would say in short-term

gain of politics, the message from the oval office to republicans is very clear, show up for sequestration is on you. >> okay. >> that's what they're saying. so good luck. >> if i were a republican, i'd take it. >> that willing fun. coming up, tom brokaw and jane pauley will be here. >> that will solve the problem. the most promising companies of 2013. who should you be investing in? >> "morning joe" inc. >> it's a gamble, i'm thinking. coming up next, mike allen is with us. he's got the "politico playbook." but first here's bill karins. >> he's a little hungover after national weatherman day. >> the parties they throw for you guys in studio 54, man. >> nothing else. >> the virgin shirley temples. let me tell you. >> kicking it old school. >> good morning, everyone. we have a difficult forecast. if you live up in new england down towards areas around new york city, maybe even new jersey, pennsylvania, pay attention. storm coming your way. possibly the most significant

winter storm of the season. right now the storm is just growing. it's in an infancy down in areas of texas providing heavy rain south of san antonio on 35, across 37 and also interstate 10 will be a wet ride between houston and san antonio. all of that rain spreads in the next 48 hours through the southeast including atlanta especially tonight into tomorrow. heavy rain through the carolinas. this is what really catches my attention. this is one of our more reliable extended forecasts. this is where the center of the storm would be on friday. early in the morning. as we go throughout the day, the storm intensifies just off of cape cod. and then at this point, the heavy snow machine would go into work, especially across new england late friday, friday through the overnight into saturday morning. this area of shaded colors here is a foot-plus for almost all of new england. the exceptions being northern new england and possibility of even new jersey getting into some of the backside bands, too. a lot of question marks for areas like new york city. our other computers also are suggesting the same thing with a

powerful storm just off the new england coastline. the bottom line is anyone that has travel plans at the airports or the roads on friday from new york city through new england, if you can do them thursday, get it done. switch your flights or whatever else because it could be kind of ugly travelwise on friday. i'll have more details as that storm approaches. you're watching "morning joe" brewed by starbucks. come on, nowadays lots of people go by themselves.

no they don't. hey son. have fun tonight. ♪ ♪ back against the wall ♪ ain't nothin to me ♪ ain't nothin to me [ crowd murmurs ] hey! ♪ [ howls ] ♪ this reduced sodium soup says it may help lower cholesterol, how does it work? you just have to eat it as part of your heart healthy diet. step 1. eat the soup. all those veggies and beans,

that's what may help lower your cholesterol and -- well that's easy [ male announcer ] progresso. you gotta taste this soup.

♪ how do you win the super bowl and then lose the trophy? everybody was holding it. they were taking pictures. and then it disappeared. oh, my gosh. and an asteroid is heading towards earth.

>> i think that's called burying the lead. >> pretty good. >> burying the lead. >> okay. time now to take a look at the "morning papers" at 31 past the hour. "the kansas city star," a recent study conducted by pew research finds more than 50% of facebook users have found value in logging off the social media website for at least a couple weeks. their reasons for taking a break vary from not having time to manage their profiles to a general lack of interest in the site. facebook currently has over 1 billion users. i'm back on facebook. i've tried. i have a page. >> yeah. >> and friends. >> yeah. >> finally. >> i know. it's interesting. i'm trying, really. i'm trying. in quotes. >> she doesn't have to actually talk to them. >> did you friend me? willie, did you? >> i'm not on the facebook. but i would if i were. >> i'm on the twitter. >> meacham, are you on the facebook?

>> i you were on the twitter. >> i was on the twitter. i don't like the twitter. >> it's fun. i think it's fun. >> you'd be good on twitter. sort of pithy. >> people are so mean. >> jon, beloved national figure. >> ruben kinkade. oh, my god. that picture, that was hilarious. >> i thought that was actually -- what show was it? >> who's calling me? >> what show was he on? >> "the partridge family." ruben. >> where were you in the '70s, man? >> i was watching watergate hearings. why can't i be sam irvin? >> uh-oh. ian's calling. >> to talk about one of my favorites band like the spoon. i love the radiohead. >> how about "the sun herald." national signing day. the top high school athletes officially declare where they will play college football next year. the nation's top prospect, defensive end robert has

narrowed his choices down to ole miss and lsu. >> why did we not put alabama in there? >> according to espn.com, the university of alabama already has 23 commitments including a five-scar recruit. >> i think we're doing well. you know who's always a five-star recruit for "morning joe." >> oh, god. >> the segue of the day. mike allen, he's the chief white house correspondent for "politico" with a look at the "playbook." good morning. >> good morning. and it's national friend mika day. >> i love it. >> there you go. >> that's exciting. >> let's get on facebook and friend mika. >> said nobody at all in america. >> that's so mean. >> go ahead. >> mike, let's talk about your piece. you're dealing with immigration this morning over at "politico." talking about the religious right starting to weigh in on this debate. people like ralph reed, the head of the southern baptist convention. what's the position? why are they getting involved now? >> this is a real change in the temperature here in washington on the immigration debate. the christian right which in the past has been quiet on

immigration are really opposed to any kind of reform is now actively working for it. we have pastors talking about it. we have religious right leaders on the hill meeting with members behind the scenes. ralph reed is head of the faith and freedom coalition, says that he sees a night-and-day difference in the attitudes of the evangelicals he talked to. so his group yesterday came out with their principles for immigration reform. but now here's the catch. their principles are very different than what's being talked about in the senate. two of the four are respect for the rule of law. then you throw in visa reform and keeping families together. and that's the rub. there's this plan in the senate which is moving along, has marco rubio behind it, but then just yesterday in the house, the judiciary at the chairman, bob goodlat of virginia, i used to work for him when i worked at "the richmond times dispatch." he said the house is not going

to be doing the big bill that the senate is doing. they're going to be doing it in pieces. he says don't rush to judgment. this shows there are two very different tracks. not clear how you can bring them together. >> one of the most exciting developments i think coming as far as political realignment goes, and i know we talk about this all the time, evangelicals. i said it before when i first got elected, young evangelical kids were focused on social issues. by the time i left just four terms later, they were talking about poverty. they were talking about aids in africa. they looked different. they changed different. >> in many ways, they're helping the republican party move in the direction it needs to go. they support the president bush on his compassionate conservative agenda. >> aids in africa. >> moving the right way on environmental policies and now they could be the cover on immigration reform. >> not only that, i remember pat robertson a few years ago and other pastors in the evangelical community starting to speak out against the death penalty. >> yeah. >> pat robertson saying we're

not consistent with new testament teaching. and i have another prediction. you're going to also see evangelicals softening the republican stance on guns, whether we're talking about universal background checks, whether we're talking about stopping the gun trafficking that kills so many young children across america. i think -- this is really an opportunity for realignment in the republican party. and actually, because evangelicals have been blamed for years for costing republicans elections. >> yeah, it's a counterintuitive narrative. >> it's counterintuitive, but there is a real chance that evangelicals across america could actually make republicans more mainstream on a lot of these issues. like you said, on the environment, on immigration, on the death penalty, on guns, on a lot of things. >> yeah. good reporting by mike allen. >> mike allen, it's fascinating, isn't it? >> it sure is. and ralph reed points out in here that the bible talks about compassion for the foreigner,

compassion for the alien. and before we go, a quick exclusive for "morning joe" viewers, richard haass has a new colleague. the cfr is going to announce today that the former treasury secretary, tim geithner, will be back in the new york headquarters as a distinguished fellow. >> oh, my gosh. >> lowering the average age down to about 81. >> but the average intelligence up a great deal. >> he's a nice guy. thank you, mike. >> does anybody here want to warn geithner? >> geithner's fine. >> he's going to be hanging out with richard. >> you know what richard's platform was? to move from tapioca to harder food. that's how he got the job. >> you know, people always talk about oh, the cfr, one-world government, international conspiracy. it's like, i've been over there, man. they can't even get my sandwich order right. there's no international plot. >> the bread gets hard. >> it's a lovely place. >> are you being mean? i love the cfr.

>> i do, too. >> do we want to talk about your club you belong to up here? >> no. >> average age, 94. >> ruben. >> all right, ruben kinkade. >> you opened the door. >> i know. the ravens celebrate her super bowl victory with all the fans there in baltimore. then safety ed reed turned the event into an audition for "american idol." >> oh, my goodness. ♪ i've got two tickets to paradise ♪ ♪ won't you pack your bags we can leave tonight ♪ ♪ whoa oh oh oh whoa whoa whoa baltimore! how do you keep an older car running like new? you ask a ford customer. when they tell you that you need your oil changed

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time for some sports at 6:42 here on the east coast. lindsey vonn, the superstar downhill skier, her chances at the '14 winter olympics in serious doubt after an ugly fall at the championships in austria. she was, of course, the gold medalist in 2010 in vancouver, tore up her knee. two torn ligaments and a broken bone. she had to be airlifted off the mountain after crashing at a super "g" event in austria yesterday. the u.s. team said in a statement, it fully expects her to be back for the 2014 games in

sochi which, as i said, begin a year from today. but man, that's a very serious injury. they say she could be back for the fall, actually. there's a new season that starts. >> she's so tough, i bet she'll be back. >> she actually won that gold medal in vancouver with a bad leg. she's tough. we hope the best for her. >> where are the olympics going to be? >> sochi, russia. >> russia. >> russia. >> what network's covering that? >> the nbc network. >> the nbc network. really? >> yes, indeed. you might hear a few things about it. >> really? they always do that. >> are you already getting your collared jacket ready? >> it's already in, yeah. >> are you going to go to russia? >> i sure hope so. let's all go to russia. by the way, nine hours ahead. the show would be on at 3:00 in the afternoon. >> they never let us go to the olympics. >> just go. >> they take willie. they pluck him. >> it's remote. >> they don't want us around. >> there's some trains, planes and automobiles. this is a live shot, by the way. >> look at the snow. is this, like, putin's backyard? where is this?

>> that's one year away. >> where is this, willie? where is this place? >> it's a little bit remote. >> how will they get there? are they building up international airports? >> they're building up an entire infrastructure. >> dogsleds. are they really? >> all the venues are built, actually. and now they're making all the highways. >> will they have an airport big enough? >> oh, yeah. >> to hold mika's private jet? >> absolutely. sochi, big airport. let's watch the ravens parading through the streets of baltimore yesterday, celebrating with thousands of fans who turned out. after the parade, more than 80,000 people packed the stadium there to see ed reed sing. ♪ we got two tickets to paradise ♪ ♪ pack your bags we can leave tonight ♪ ♪ whoa oh oh oh whoa whoa whoa baltimore!

y'all know i can't -- baltimore -- ♪ oh oh oh oh oh ♪ oh oh oh oh oh oh >> so that's ed reed doing a little eddie money. and then going right into the ravens' theme song which is, of course, "seven nation army" by the white stripes. that's what the fans sing to keep everybody up. >> i love it. >> "mika's must-read opinion pages" next.

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♪ in the middle of the night it can be frustrating. it's hard to turn off and go back to sleep. intermezzo is the first and only prescription sleep aid approved for use as needed in the middle of the night when you can't get back to sleep. it's an effective sleep medicine you don't take before bedtime. take it in bed only when you need it and have at least four hours left for sleep. do not take intermezzo if you have had an allergic reaction to drugs containing zolpidem, such as ambien. allergic reactions such as shortness of breath or swelling of your tongue or throat may occur and may be fatal. intermezzo should not be taken if you have taken another sleep medicine at bedtime or in the middle of the night or drank alcohol that day. do not drive or operate machinery until at least 4 hours after taking intermezzo and you're fully awake. driving, eating, or engaging in other activities while not fully awake without remembering the event the next day have been reported. abnormal behaviors may include aggressiveness, agitation,

hallucinations, or confusion. alcohol or taking other medicines that make you sleepy may increase these risks. in depressed patients, worsening of depression, including risk of suicide, may occur. intermezzo, like most sleep medicines, has some risk of dependency. common side effects are headache, nausea, and fatigue. so if you suffer from middle-of-the-night insomnia, ask your doctor about intermezzo and return to sleep again. ♪ a live look at the capitol as the sun comes up over washington at 49 past the hour. welcome back to "morning joe." time now for the "must-read opinion pages." this is dana milbank who writes in "the washington post" about

eric cantor's empty happy talk. "the sunday routine was a difficult one for cantor who has made a career in washington of being testy and acidic. his delivery was forced and as he read his text, he seemed to be reminding himself to grin. as a result, he scowled for much of the speech and sounded as though he were spitting out his words. smiles formed at inopportune times such as when he described a boy's failure in public school. when it came to what his party would do to make people to buoyant and uplifted, cantor had little beyond the policies he and his colleagues have long offered." joe, do you agree with that? you think that's fair? >> no. i think i've misjudged eric cantor. >> really? >> i really do. because talking to democrats, in fact, talking to -- well, i'm not going to say who it is, but one of the top people in american government that's a democrat said that cantor works quietly behind the scenes and was really trying to reach out

and try to do a deal when the president and boehner couldn't get the deal done. so i don't know. katty kay, i don't think it's empty talk yesterday, if only because you even have democrats saluting eric cantor for talking about a pathway to citizenship for younger americans. basically endorsed the dream act yesterday. coming from eric cantor, that is a significant move forward for house republicans. >> yeah. in terms of his policy shifts, that seems to have been the biggest one. he stopped short of comprehensive immigration reform on a path to citizenship for everybody who's here illegally. but he endorsed, as you said, it for younger americans. he spoke a lot about education. he even praised san francisco's education system and the schools there, which is perhaps not the most obvious place for somebody as conservative as eric cantor. this is a speech, joe, that he tested out in davos at the world

economic forum to try and give, as you've been talking about, the republican party a kind of more open, friendlier edge not just to be talking about number crunching, not just to be talking about deficit reduction because he feels and people in the party feel that that's given them the image of people that are just concerned about the numbers, about the bottom line, about those issues. naturally they need to be addressing issues that families are concerned about, infrastructure and immigration as well. there wasn't a whole lot new in terms of radical policy proposals. and i hate to say this. i kind of agree with dana milbank on the optics of it. he's not the easiest sunny guy. he's not a paul ryan guy who finds it easy to smile and connect with people. he does come across as a little stiff. he is a policy wonk. but, you know, good -- i guess, you know, you would, i'm sure, agree that this is the direction the party needs to be going in, not just to be having that reputation as deficit hawks and only deficit hawks. >> right. and of course, i make no apology

for the fact that that's why i got into politics and what drives me the most is the deficit and the debt. and i think some republicans -- i'm actually concerned that they're talking about hey, let's move away from this issue. and the cbo report also showed, mika, in seven years, the united states of america is going to be spending more money on servicing the interest on our debt, interest payments on our debt, than we will every dollar we spend on national defense. >> all right. >> anyway. >> so let me read mark mckinnon's before we go to break. you keep hammering away at it. >> they do. >> this is in "the telegraph"? >> "the london sunday telegraph." >> very nice. in response to all the talk about lance armstrong, mark has written this, in part. "i think we've got it all wrong. athletes and entertainers aren't heroes. they are mere mortals with talent and skbigs. in a hyper-competitive world, they are driven to almost always

bend the rules in the pursuit of all that fame brings with it. and then when they achieve fame, they think they are no longer subject to the boundaries that apply to the rest of society. the lesson we should pass along to our children is that the real measure of heroism should be the deeds we do when no one is watching. it's the things we do for others without any expectation of compensation, recognition, or reward. it's the small, quiet footprints we leave behind." it is kind of hard to take in the lance armstrong story. i don't get him. i feel like maybe there's part of him that we've misunderstood, but he does come off as a complete jerk in this whole thing. >> that's part of what i'm writing about. i think the incentive structure for people to achieve in sports or entertainment, it's all about fame when really, you know, the people who lead productive lives and connect with their community, the people who are serving selflessly, and i write about my family doctor who's a guy who could have gone on to rich and fame in a specialized profession but chose to do family practice instead. and he's the most humble and

incredible servant of democracy, really, practicing his medicine in a really humble way. >> great piece. katty kay -- >> those are the heroes. >> they should be. >> thank you very much for being on this morning. >> see you soon. >> all right. >> do you think she interrupted me too much? was she more in her lanes this time? what do you think, willie? >> i hadn't noticed the problem previously. >> she's clicking. >> she's still worried about india. >> yeah, she is. maybe that's why she is angry. >> she gets angry about that. >> you should hear the things she said about gandhi. worse than churchill. it's unbelievable. still ahead, "forbes" magazine is out with its annual rankings of america's most promising companies. we'll run through the list. >> "morning joe" is number three. >> coming up on "morning joe." [ man ] ring ring... progresso this reduced sodium soup says it may help lower cholesterol, how does it work? you just have to eat it as part of your heart healthy diet.

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we've also seen the effects that political dysfunction can have on our economic progress. the drawn-out process for resolving the fiscal cliff hurt consumer confidence. the threat of massive automatic cuts have already started to affect business decisions. so we've been reminded that while it's critical for us to cut wasteful spending, we can't just cut our way to prosperity. >> that's ridiculous. welcome back to "morning joe." >> you weren't talking about the president. >> no. of course not. >> the picture in the "new york post." >> tom brokaw looked at it, and he was very -- >> jon meacham is with us. with us at the table, the director of the earth institute

at columbia university, economist dr. jeffrey sachs and nbc news' tom brokaw. like simon & garfunkel getting back together in the park. you and jane pauley. >> this is going to be huge. she's coming on today. >> i know she is. i dialed back and realized how long we had known each other. >> how'd that go? >> you can never look back, as don henley said. don't count the years. not good for any of us. >> in the fall of 1976, we were joined on the "today" show. i had covered watergate for three years and now the "today" show so i interviewed miss america like she had stolen the tierra. what did miss america know. >> how much things haven't changed. >> and jane came in from chicago and there was chaos at the top of nbc in those days. there had been a lot of turmoil in the executive ranks. i later said about the two of us, we were sent out in a life raft floating through the morning hours trying to find our way, and we did eventually.

>> you certainly did. incredible. a new government report, dr. sachs, is out predicting that the deficit is going to drop from $1 trillion for the first time since obama's presidency. the cbs which assumes federal spending cuts are going to be going into effect march 1st says the government's going to run a deficit of $845 trillion. let's get the confetti out. the cbo also says that in the next seven years, jeffrey, we're going to be spending more money on servicing interest on our debt than we are on national defense. and that's a lot of money. and that's assuming interest rates don't go up to their historic average. >> yesterday's report was not good news. people should actually take a look at it. it's online. congressional budget office. it basically showed that we cannot afford the deal that we made two months ago when we made permanent all of those tax cuts.

now what the report shows is okay. well, that added about $4.6 trillion cumulatively over the next ten years in debt. the debt service is going to be enormous. it's crowding out everything. like you say, it will be at an all-time high -- or nearly an all-time high, more than 3% of national income pay just to service the public debt by the end of the decade. >> right. you talk about crowding out. >> by the way, more than not only defense but more than all of the civilian programs of our government. >> everything. >> yeah. >> except, of course, medicare and medicaid. >> exactly. >> and speaking of crowding out, jeffrey, people say oh, we don't have a debt problem, which is just shocking to me. and now some of obama's, i think, most desperate supporters are saying oh, the deficit problems over the deficit's going down. this year alone, medicare, medicaid, social security and interest on the debt consumes every dollar that washington

takes in. this is such a crisis, and it's growing. >> well, this whole idea that don't worry about the debt, you had a little tangle with the krugman a couple of weeks ago. this exposes how wrong the view is. don't worry about the debt because the debt has built to a large number what the congressional budget office is showing is that we're going to be paying a lot of money on that debt, and it's going to crowd out vital public services. and that's why we had to worry about the debt all along. and we didn't. now it's built up. now we're facing reality. i thought it was a little odd. the president said, well, we have to do something, but he didn't offer anything to do because the main part he played was two months ago, he said, let's make the tax cuts permanent, both sides, and now we see, well, you can't afford that. >> you talk about paul krugman -- >> that's what they ended up. >> it's fascinating, paul krugman and some other people kept coming back saying oh, don't worry about medicare until medicare collapses.

and that's what was said. we don't have to worry about that, and we don't have to worry about the deficits. i think you can do two things at once. i say it every day. we can invest in education, r&d, we can invest in infrastructure. we can grow this economy in the short term, but we can take care of the long-term debt by focusing on health care costs over a generation, by cutting defense spending, but tax reform, by doing all of these things. it should be simple to do. washington seems incapable of doing it. and these debt deniers, i'm curious if you agree with mika and richard haass and steve rattner that these debt deniers have their head in the sand as much as climate change deniers do. >> i think the whole political class refuse to look forward. and the cbo takes a ten-year view, and that ten-year view is pretty ugly. that's the problem. and yet the politics and this kind of short-term stimulus and let's look one year, let's look two years, let's not worry about

the buildup of these problems, finally shows up when you see a report like yesterday which shows what does it mean over a ten-year period of time? debt doesn't kill you the first day. it's how it builds up. but you have to look at how it builds up. and now it's really building up. >> and deficits don't kill you, mika, the first day, the first year, the second year. as jeffrey and i were saying, back in january of 2009, it's not the deficits that kill you. it's wasting the money which they wasted during the stimulus, as jeffrey and i said, that kills you. we can afford short-term deficits if we get something in return over the long run. >> so tom, what's the solution? we argue that the president hasn't put any details forward. the white house would come back and say in 2012 he offered $4 trillion in cuts. during the deficit negotiations, he offered $900 billion in spending cuts. but then when you pick through what the cuts are, is that the

problem? >> which ones? >> i've got a list here. >> never specific. he's never specific. never specific. >> there are specifics. it seems to me as long as one side is putting out what the cuts are, the other side's not going to agree with them because it's politically dangerous. don't they have to go in and do it together? but i think accusing the white house of not offering cuts or even accusing the other side of not offering cuts is not necessarily fair. because they have been specific. >> no, they haven't. >> i think -- >> i hate to interrupt you. they have not been specific. >> i think a big part of the problem -- i don't want to get in the middle of this whole thing. >> you can get right in the middle of it. we're fine. >> this reminds me on a couple of different levels of what it was like in the summer before 9/11. the intelligence in america knew that there was a terrorist attack coming. we had had attacks on our embassies in tanzania and kenya, attacks on the "uss cole." and yet we insisted on ignoring them. george tenet was the cia head at

the time. he said, my hair is on fire in july of that year. i went down to see the fbi about something else. they said, you ought to take a look at terrorism. we just blithely kept going and then it blew up in our face. this is an opportunity, it seems to me, to take the immigration example of people in the house and in the senate to cross party lines and say, let's begin by doing something about medicare. we know -- we all know we have to do something about that. let's begin by doing something about tax reform. they have moved on immigration, which is an encouraging sign, but it's less than the sum of the parts at this moment in terms of how they want to take a kind of whole approach to what we're going to have to do. and there's going to have to be some people from the ground up in the house and the senate who are going to seize this and say, i don't want this on my record. i'm serving in congress. i'm serving in the senate. and when i go out of here, historians are going to look back and say that we completely failed our responsibility. shifted the burden to the young

people. and then went home. i mean, congress has not improved its standing with the american people in the last couple of months. it was not a kumbaya moment when we had the inauguration in which people came together and said now we're going to solve things. they went back to their entrenched positions, and that's where they're stuck. >> you say everybody needs to do something on medicare, on health care costs. there are debt deniers out there. we've had one on our show, and he's got scores of people -- oh, there's no problem with the debt. in fact, the deficit, it's going down, so don't worry, be happy. these are climate change deniers. >> joe, but we haven't even begun to talk about the other issue that is tertiary out there which is that municipal and state levels and the pension funds that are underfunded and can't be fully realized. those are in play here as well. so it's not just at the federal level. and if we ever needed an objective lesson on the high costs of debt and overreaching, look what we've been through in the last nine years. just ask an individual homeowner

who was told you can afford that house. fine se sign here. you take that to the federal level. that's what we're dealing with. the country is under water. that's the phrase we use in mortgages, and we're not dealing with it here. >> all right. so dr. sachs, if leading republicans took the president up on his offer and showed up on his doorstep right now, which is what he has said, and they tried to agree on spending cuts, what do you think would happen? >> i don't think they're going to. and i think we're going to go to a sequester. which is what was agreed before. >> what do you think? >> i think that's the next step. it's more or less set. very hard to see any deals being made right now. the fact that the president wouldn't come forward with one specific yesterday signifies he's not taking any political risk at all. if he's not taking any political risk, no one else is going to take a political risk. we're just to auto drive at this point. >> why isn't the president

giving any specific spending cuts here? why hasn't he given any specific spending cuts? he'll throw out like oh, you know, i want to reform entitlements. will $4 trillion here or there, but there are never any specific cuts attached. why not? >> you know my view. that's the job of the president, in my view, is to put down specifics. it could be specifics on spending and taxes. i'm not saying it's all one or the other. but it should be specifics. if the president just says we shouldn't have happen what we agreed will happen next month so somebody should do something, our system can't function that way. unless the president lays out an alternative path, we don't get to an alternative path. and i don't think he's going to, and i don't think the congress is going to agree on anything. so we won't have these cuts. these cuts will not -- they won't kill us, but they're just more evidence of us heading in the wrong direction. >> hey, jon meacham, it's somebody's birthday today.

>> it is. >> ronald reagan. >> ronald reagan. >> who had to make a very tough deal with dan rostenkowski and tip o'neill, two guys that did not like each other politically but figured out how to get along personally. that seems like such a quaint notion. >> it does. >> social security was going under, and a conservative republican and liberal democrats got together and fixed it. >> and in 1986 in the second term, which is supposed to be so troubled, got a big tax reform act. going through what was called gucci gulch. so the emergence of lobbyists, the emergence of great financial problems is not particularly new. and they were able to cut this deal without mythologizing too much the mafia of that period. it is true, as mrs. reagan will remind you, that o'neill is the

first person they had to the white house, to the family quarters. and they were -- there was more of a sense that they had to cut a deal without, again, not kumbaya, to use tom's image, it wasn't that. when things really mattered and you had to cooperate, they were able to get these two deals. >> tom? >> chris matthews likes to talk about what it was like when he worked for tip o'neill on the hill, the speaker. he said once a week in the back room, jim baker would be sitting back there. he was the chief of staff for ronald reagan. he would slip up to the hill and say, mr. speaker, here's where we're thinking about going. what's your reaction to that? and they'd have constantly opening lines of communication between the white house and the hill and what was possible, what needs to be done. jon and i both have read reagan's diaries, for example, which are a remarkable political document, in my judgment, don't you think? >> absolutely. >> you really get an insight into what he was thinking. after i think the tax reform deal, jack kemp came screaming down to the white house saying

this is the worst idea you've ever had. they had an argument for about an hour. then the president wrote in his diary, congressman kemp doesn't get it. what he needs to understand is that we had to give a little so that we could get something out of all this. and you see the play of negotiation that was going on, eyeball to eyeball. and president reagan was not always involved, but he had an a-team on his staff in congressional relations and jim baker and the other people who were in the middle of all of it. >> there's no doubt, another, by the way, great man who has a birthday. >> celebrating his birthday. >> happy birthday, tom, right? i called you out. >> same day as president reagan. >> happy birthday. >> my grandfather and i have the same birthday and then i grew up to discover i have the same birthday as ronald reagan. we had some memorable moments. i'd be down at the white house for a briefing on the state of the union, for example, at lunch on this day. and no one at the table would know until the president would come in and put his arm around me and say, "happy birthday." i had a note yesterday from mrs.

reagan. we always exchanged some kind of a communication. i hope to talk to her later today as well. >> speaking of ronald reagan, though, can you imagine what ronald reagan, a guy who we've all grown up thinking was the conservatives' conservative. i'm sure jeffrey sachss would agree with that, very conservative guy. can you imagine what ronald reagan would be called by some republicans? >> a rino. >> republican in name only. >> liberal. >> there's something else, joe, that i think is important about ronald reagan's ramp-up to the presidency. i was there when he got elected governor of california. the first campaign i covered when i joined nbc was ronald reagan's run for the nomination. he had not yet gotten the nomination in the spring of 1966. then he arrives in sacramento with a very hard right kind of agenda. we're going to turn this state around in a different direction.

and he encounters the state legislature which is run by brilliant politician of the speaker assembly in those days who had been a great senator, by the way, and willie brown and bob moretti and mosconi. at the end of three months, he said this guy is a lot smarter than we realized, and you can work with him. they would go in and close the door and they'd make the deals at the state level. that went on for two terms. >> by the way, that was the union negotiator coming out in reagan, and reagan always said, it was a lot harder dealing with jack warner than it was gorbachev. and he was serious. >> of course he was. but the point is, california was the equivalent of the sixth largest nation in the world. i mean, it was not just some small town state legislature. this was a huge economy, a big-state budget, a university system. they had to do something about the mental health institutions, for example, in the state. and it was exploding in terms of population. so by the time he got to

washington, he had really been through a trial by fire, and he was ready for what he knew he had to do on behalf of the country. he had also -- people ought to remember this -- he had been through a really tough campaign. george bush 41 beat him in iowa in the opening of the primaries. >> in '80. >> in '80. he was prepared in a way for what he arrived at. and i think it's worth remembering. >> so let's take a trip down memory lane. >> oh, i like that. >> i love doing this. here's a clip of tom brokaw in 1967. >> what? >> yeah. watch this. >> interviewing dwight eisenhower during eisenhower's visit to see then-governor and presidential candidate ronald reagan. wow! >> almost four years ago now you encouraged all republicans who thought that they might be candidates for president to get into the race. do you still stand by that feeling? >> i like that case. as a matter of fact, that's the reason i like the favorite son theory. because you bring a lot of people in and let all the

delegates a chance to look at them, think about it and say, who do we want? i'm very much for the favorite son. >> reporter: at the same time, sir, three years ago you would not endorse any candidate until after the nomination at the convention. >> well, that's true because i'm a republican, i'm going to support any republican, i hope. >> oh, my gosh. tom. >> i was 26 years old. >> reagan was looking at you like, who is this guy? >> i knew -- reagan was not a presidential candidate at that point, but there was a stealth underground campaign being built for him by the kitchen cabinet. and what's interesting about this is that nixon was already moving around. we knew that he was probably going to run. and ike didn't reach out and say anything about richard nixon. reagan had gone down to palm springs to visit ike to getting a laying out of the hands of the new governor of california. if you see reagan off to the side there, he was 56 years old. dashing looking. looked every inch the role of a governor.

and ike died not too long after that, actually. but it was a memorable occasion for me. >> wow, i bet. that was really cool. >> '66 is such a great year because you have reagan wins the governorship. george bush sr. wins the house seat. nixon's running around building up those chips for '68. it all kind of grew out of that year. >> it really did. it's so interesting, those two republicans both gained a lot by being underestimated. you said reagan was underestimated. ike, we heard for years, you know, my mom. i mean, my family, they were all fdr democrats. and whenever i grew up and asked her about ike, oh, he wasn't that smart. he just went around playing golf and he was owned by corporate ceos. and he played that to his advantage. >> i don't want to get too far down into the political history weeds here, but -- >> i think that's too late, tom. >> oh, we're here. >> something else worth remembering. pat brown got beat by reagan. he built the california water

system, he built the university system. he really made the modern state of california, but it cost the middle class a lot of money, and they turned against that when reagan ran. reagan exploited that. now who's the governor of california? >> you got it. >> jerry brown. third term. and what is he doing? he's saying the legacy of my father was important to the state. we're going to rebuild the state university system. we're going to bring it back because it's the great engine that drives growth here in california. he got a tax increase through this last election. >> he's doing it. >> they're balancing their budget. it's a state that we ought to keep our eye on, frankly, in terms of what they're getting done out there. >> continuing with cool, up next, former host of "today" and emmy award-winning journalist jane pauley joins us to discuss the unprecedented influence of baby boomers and how they're changing the face of aging. you're watching "morning joe" brewed by starbucks. ♪ they see me rollin' ♪ they hatin' ♪ patrolling they tryin' to catch me ridin' dirty ♪

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occasionally we forget to put on a microphone. >> got to keep the equipment warm. >> not many of us these days get a chance -- wait a minute. we'll be talking about his life as an actor and as a person because there is a difference. jane pauley is here, too. >> and she is a person as well. >> i'm glad to have that certified and before us. we had all expected that. nice of you to confirm. >> my pleasure. >> i think that people know that she is jane pauley through and through. that she doesn't wear one mask in the morning or one mask in one interview and another in another. she is at the center, just rock solid. >> oh, wow. that's cool. that was a clip from a 1989 tribute to jane pauley on her last day. that was cute. as host of the "today" show. with us now to talk about her

latest project, emmy award-winning journalist, jane pauley. she has two specials about baby boomers airing tonight on rltv. "boomers 2.0 a generation reimagined." and also "rethink 50-plus town hall." we'll talk more about that. i can't believe you're here. >> boomer shmoomers. let's talk about this. >> i love her. and you two together. >> that was very kind, what you said. replay that over and over again, that would be fine with me. tom once was quoted in "the washington post" saying that jane was very realistic about her deficiencies. >> isn't that a nice way of saying you're transparent and real? >> this was true. but it was true. i'm a midwesterner. and i'm very realist being about my deficiencies. and as i have grown into my maturity and my boomerness, i'm also more realistic about my strengths of which i have a few. >> hold on. i've got to ask jane a question here, tom. >> yeah, he's in charge. >> is tom realistic about his

deficiencies? >> god, no. be honest. >> tom has no deficiencies. >> that's why we got along so well. >> you just answered it. you just answered it. all right, tom. >> the deficiency thing only came because she moved to new york and rented an apartment in the only building on the upper east side that was made of blue bricks. >> i had trouble with that blue. >> blue brick. >> you found it for me. then he found me a boyfriend who i later married. 30-something years ago. >> it was actually meredith who said you think gary's hanging around your office because he wants to be your pal a little more? i said yeah, i think so. she said no, it's all about jane. >> i think the miracle is that -- the miracle is that i had a more than 30-year career at nbc. >> right. >> i'm still here at nbc. though i have to stop at the visitors center and get a guest badge. >> come on, now. >> but i'm still here at nbc. if you had told that 25-year-old jane that she would still, at 62, be anywhere near a camera in

high definition, you know, but now here i am talking about a boomer special on rltv partnered with aarp. i do a series on the "today" show monthly about reinvention, people 50-plus. >> there you go. >> we're still the cool kids. >> you actually really are. how long did you two cohost together? how many years? >> five years. >> just five years. >> really? was that the breaking point? is that the breaking point? is that when you can't take it anymore? i'm just wondering because we're at five years. >> we went 13. >> we're talking a pair. >> he abandoned me. >> right. >> he abandoned me. >> is that what happens? >> we had a great run. i must say, you know, everything involved, and in those days, from 1976 when we began until 1981 when we left, there was a lot going on in the world. the election of ronald reagan and the pope got shot.

so that got assassinated. >> now, i would move aside and i would occupy a little stool over in the corner. or if i, you know, to let tom do his thing. or if i was there, my role was to put a log on the fire because this is the best ad-libber in the business. but if he ran out of gas, i would just give him another log. and off we would go. >> it was a true team effort. we had gene shalit as well. and it became a real family thing. we went through a difficult period, ratings went down for a while. we got back to first place. and everything worked out fine. but it was kind of taking on the world every morning. we had maybe a third of the staff that they now have on the "today" show, and the backing of the network was, as i said, a little chaotic at that time. we got through it, and we got through it together because we were doing two hours every morning side by side. jane was married to gary at that point. and my kids are growing up. and so you go through a lot of experiences in life. and i think the audience tunes

into that. they kind of watch it. >> yeah, morning television -- my friends, you were mentioning that i was going to be here yesterday, you know. suddenly my text lights up. you know, jane. so evidently a lot of people in my demographic are watching you. which frankly is why, you know, we're doing the special. the whole point of it -- >> well, talk about it. >> well, the whole point of is that, you know, for a while advertisers kind of ignored us. we went off a cliff. 18 to 49 is the sweet spot. i think that was stretched 18 to 54, which i'm history with that number. but between 50 and 60, we owned 75% of the wealth in this country. boomers spend $2 trillion a year annually on consumer goods. we are four times as likely to buy a tablet as a 20 to 29-year-old, primarily because we have the money.

we're very much on the internet. like three-quarters of us are on the internet. one-third of us are heavy users. we use it to buy, to shop. we use it to stay connected, you know, with community and so forth. we are still very engaged. one of the guests on the town hall program that's on tomorrow, the two programs, between 8:00 and 10:00 on rltv, one of the guests said that boomers are quickly moving from making money to spending it. and they have money. >> and power, as a result. >> and power. so we are changing things for everybody for the better because i've been proclaimed -- in fact, the only credential i have is that costco magazine called me a reinvention evangelisevangelistt i am. but no one's going to be talking about reinvention 50-plus after my generation. they will take it for granted. that, you know, retirement is

something you move from something to something else. that will be taken for granted. so, you know, gen-xors turning 50 in five years. did you know that? gen-xors, welcome aboard. >> these numbers that you use, 50. 50 doesn't mean what it used to mean. i remember my mom turned 40, and she thought and everybody thought the world was coming to an end. things have changed so dramatically. you talk about the demos, 18 to 49. phil griffin talks about this all the time. >> it's a shrinking demographic, joe. >> it should be -- instead of 25 to 54, it should be 35 to 64. boomers are going to spend their money. >> yeah. but the 18 to 49 is a cbs executive put it who does research, 18 to 49 is a shrinking demographic. you know, every year it is getting smaller. why would you deliberately pitch your programming to a demographic you know is shrinking? >> shrinking, right. >> it used to be, as i was going

to say, 40 was a benchmark for women that we didn't look forward to, and i think that is extending for sure. >> well, get me back. i'm going to be -- 70 is -- 70 is pretty good. >> it's not looking bad, jane. >> 73 is pretty good. >> today is his birthday. >> we need a birthday cake. >> i was actually back with some high school friends a couple of years ago in our hometown. we're all the same age. and at the end of the evening, i said to them, who do we remember when we were 18 in this community who was a 70-year-old male? because we were all 70-plus. we could name one guy. everybody had died by the time they got to 65, 66. >> wow. >> so this life extension is having an enormous impact. also, we were talking about this earlier, it does create the bulge in medicare and the social services that people have expectations for and what health concerns that we have. and that has to fit into.

>> but what isn't factored into that -- and i'm not policy and i'm not an economist -- but what i do know is if boomers -- those who are not being hammered by the recession, i know yesterday that's what you were talking about, which is a reality, but a lot of us are still engaged in the economy. we are still producers. we're not just -- >> takers. >> -- takers, but we are still producing and contributing to the growth of an economy. and i don't think that's kind of factored into people's expectations that we suddenly are going to start being, you know, plugged up to machines and sucking money out of the economy. >> well, that's why i think it's so smart that you're producing programming that appeals to a demographic that is important, powerful, rich and engaged. so then my next question would be -- >> why high definition? that's all. >> no. what do you think of morning television? >> very dynamic.

the "today" show that tom and i used to do, they talk about new york being the city that never sleeps. yes, it did. we would arrive in a very quiet city. 30 rock, there was no one here. they maybe had polished the floors, but the floor polishers were gone. today it's so alive. segments are 3 1/2 minutes long. >> it's earlier. >> it's like riding a bush in rush hour traffic on the fdr drive. i don't know how the stamina to be a host on the morning shows, it's very, very different. and it's a much bigger -- a bigger audience that americans are still the most productive on earth. we get up early. we go to work. you know, we work late. but i think morning television has always been the freshest, most dynamic part of television. the fact that my friends tell me that you were talking yesterday, you know, people are there.

they're really watching. >> we were talking about it all morning. >> so many things have changed. well, i told them i had a crush on you growing up. >> i know, i heard that. >> the thing is everything's changed -- >> are you saying you got over it? >> no, i never said that. i'm sorry, do we have any tape from yesterday? did i say i got over my crush? >> he did not. i can confirm. >> but everything changes. we talk about how baby boomers are changing. you know, it used to be advertisers would say, you know what? we're not going to try to talk to anybody over 54 because by 54 or 55, they start saving money. their spending habits don't change. it's part of who boomers are. boomers grew up believing they had a god-given right to get whatever the hell they wanted to get. >> what's new? >> that doesn't stop at 64. >> change is our dna. >> they're going to be spending money till the day they die. and also, you talk about other habits, too. it used to be my family would stop at 6:30 and we'd watch the evening news. people work through that now. and the biggest shock, we went

to phil early on. you know, we can't do the 6:00 a.m. stuff anymore. it's garbage. and phil, through the numbers, he goes, that's when the most people watch you. that's when the most influential people watch you. >> yeah. >> people get up so early now. they start working early. >> they work at home. they're on their treadmills. >> all of these, you know, things that we assumed we knew about boomers and about the economy has completely changed. >> the news demographic has always been 50-plus. the news about that is that there are just so many more of us. >> right. >> but we are getting our news -- i love the newspaper, you know, tell me how much i have to pay you to keep delivering me, you know, this. >> right. >> but i also get news all day long, as everybody else does, you know, streaming. you know, you keep checking, refresh, refresh, refresh. >> right. >> you know, we're the

demographic that's eating that stuff up. >> yeah. >> but also, somewhat my children have more in common with their parents than my generation had with their parents. >> that's the big change is that we are so much closer to our children than we were to our parents and how we see the world and what our interests and tastes are and how they call you nine times a day about everything that's on their mind, the children calling the parents. meredith and i left home. we loved our parents. they were important to us. never called back to say, what do you think we should do about buying a house or taking a job or having a child? >> or where did you get those glasses? >> exactly. >> love your glasses, pop. where did you get them? they're really hip. >> mine suggested i change my glasses. >> who wouldn't like that? >> exactly. who wouldn't like that? you can catch jane pauley on back-to-back shows starting with "boomers 2.0" at 8:00 p.m. followed by "the rethink 50-plus town hall discussion." tomorrow on rltv, a network

created in the growing response of power to this demographic. jane pauley, it is so good to meet you and have you on. tom, thank you as well. >> thank you. >> happy birthday! >> you're perfect because jane said so. >> great to be here. >> exactly. >> otherwise i wouldn't believe it. coming up, america's most promising companies, "forbes" is out with its annual rankings. we'll go through the list straight ahead on "morning joe."

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the editor of "forbes" magazine, randall lane on the companies you should be investing in. you're watching "morning joe" brewed by starbucks. look at you, so dashing.

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with multiple lacerations to the wing and a fractured beak. surgery was successful, but he will be in a cast until it is fully healed, possibly several months. so, if the duck isn't able to work, how will he pay for his living expenses? aflac. like his rent and car payments? aflac. what about gas and groceries? aflac. cell phone? aflac, but i doubt he'll be using his phone for quite a while cause like i said, he has a fractured beak. [ male announcer ] send the aflac duck a get-well card at getwellduck.com.

with us now, editor of "forbes" magazine, randall lane. the new issue features a special report on america's most promising companies. and i have a tweet from moira forbes saying i need to make sure i grill you. >> thanks, moira. appreciate that. >> you are on the firing line this morning. good to have you on the show.

>> let's start. jeffrey sachs and i, forget the list, we went straight to this billionaire bistro. talk about this shot. it's fascinating. >> the four seasons actually let us in and showed us their appointment book. it's really an amazing place. this is the commissary of wealth and power. you cannot go there on any given day and not bump into either a billionaire or a cabinet secretary at every single table. and it's amazing actually to go there and just watch the interaction. and when people, you know, i mean, conspiracy theorists would have a field day here. it's mostly people going for a good lunch. >> they're all there -- yeah. hanging out with other billionaires. five years from now, some people, maybe the list you guys are putting out, the most promising companies may be sitting around the four seasons over there. let's talk about, these are the companies you say the next googles. >> yeah. >> let's start with number one.

3cinteractive. >> basically when you get things on your cell phone like offering you a coupon or your phone tells you you're over your minutes, this is the software that communicates with your phone. and it's, again, simple things that you take for granted that you get kind of sms messages to your phone. they do it. they have john scully as their chairman. best known, of course, for firing steve jobs, but i think he's making amends here. >> making a comeback. >> i don't know. would you really want to hire the guy guy who fired steve job? >> he put money in, so i think they were happy to have him. growing at 60% a year, so i think he has a comeback opportunity here based on the information and research we did. >> he's got a lot of work to do to come back. >> want to go to number four because it's connected with number one. again, we're taking about microtargeting, whether it's on cell phones or with rocket fuel. >> yeah. >> this is a group that uses data and machine lighting to place online ads in the most

relevant demographics. >> the companies that do the things that are we all are kind of noticing but don't know how it happens. when you log on to a website and there's a banner ad that talks about a left-handed scuba divers and you're left-handed and you like scuba diving, how do they do that? this is the company that figures out. they watch how you surf. they then package that information to marketers, and they are able to target advertising. they did $100 million in revenue last year, so this is big business. >> okay. >> this is not a niche. >> virtual instruments, number three. >> this is one of the -- the cloud is big, and this is one of those companies that will help big companies figure out how to manage the cloud, and we're seeing a lot of cloud-based companies popping all over the list. >> number four, rocket fuel. >> just talked about that. >> number five, pop chips. >> what are pop chips in. >> who has had a pop chip. >> i've had a pop chip. >> love or like? >> i don't like them at all.

rice cakes meets potato chips but whether i like it or not doesn't seem to matter because they are doing 80% growth. >> 94 million for popchips. >> rice cake chips. >> we need to talk about this. >> kind of a replacement, lower fat replacement for potato chips. >> right. >> do you like them in. >> in terms of trying to reproduce the taste of a chip. >> a little cardboardy. >> they have done the best job at it. the question is do you need any of that, you know? >> so they have big shot -- they have famous investors which kind of helps with the buzz. when you're selling kind of snacks, it helps to make it look cool so they have ashton kutcher and didi and got a sweetheart deal to put their name against it, but there's a cool factor. again, if you're selling basically kind of cardboard rice cake potato things. >> right. >> that helps. >> kind of amazing. they are number five on the list. >> missed number two though, think finance.

>> think finance is an unbelievable company. this company did about $500 million of revenues last year. they are basically a, i don't know any other way to put it, a digital loan shark, if your paycheck is coming in two days and you need a loan that you can get a loan online immediately and the annual interest rate, some of these loans are 1,000% apr. you know, if you need 100 bucks, two days later you have to pay back 125, if you do the math, the interest rates are unbelievable, and so the profits are unbelievable. there's a market. taking what you used to have to go to the street corner and worry about getting knee-capped for and make it somewhat legit. $500 million last year. >> my god. >> all right. >> unbelievable. >> this is a good issue. >> it is. you talk about really quickly nba valuations, the richest players in the nba. talk about that list. >> we, have i mean, you know, the team that's most ascendant here in new york, the new york knicks. they are winning after years and years of kind of being laughing

stocks. i mean, acwinner translates to full seats, luxury boxes and that's where the money is. you share the national tv pie. to really pop you've got to do to locally. >> coffee bryant making $60 million, lebron 67 million, derrick rose 32 million a year, dwyane wade makes 30 million a year, kevin durant 30 million a year. carmelo anthony 28 million a year. >> but the real way to make the money, look at where the money is. it's off the court. the guys at the top have the crazy sneaker deals. salary cap sport, you make it as an entrepreneur to real make the big bucks. >> the new issue of "forbes" is out right now. randall lane, thanks so much. >> thanks. >> coming up next, the white house makes the legal case for drone strikes on americans. but does it pass the constitution test?

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looking ahead to tomorrow. author and president and ceo of the aspen institute, walter isaacson will be here. coming up next, a dire warning from the congressional budget office on the nation's long-term debt. that as the president makes his case against mandatory spending cuts. something has to give. we'll discuss with our panel next on "morning joe."

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i know that some of you who are incredibly concerned about my weight, and i appreciate your concern. anyone who has struggled with their weight over time in this state or in this country will tell you that when they begin the plan, they have every intention of fulfilling the plan, and so the plan which i begin today i have every intention of fulfilling. i hope i can fulfill it by tonight, and then if i can, then tomorrow i'll start it and we'll go and we'll go again, but i'm not -- i'm not going to be overly self-consumed about this, and nor should the people of the

state be all that concerned about whether i can do my job. i can get out of bed every morning. >> good morning. it's 8:00 on the east coast. 5:00 a.m. on the west coast. it is time to wake up as you take a live look at new york city. welcome back to "morning joe." back with us on set, john meech. >> he's great. >> mark mckinnon. >> and in washington kathy kay. >> do you think she will interrupt you? >> i hope so. >> snap, snap. >> what do you think about that? >> i think it's a little late to be asking him about his weight, as if it's a big huge issue that we don't know anything about. they have the former white house doctor commenting on his weight saying he'll drop dead in office. ridiculous. >> his own doctor, he admitted yesterday in this press conference, said that he was worried about chris christie's weight and said his luck would run out soon. >> what's breaking news about this? >> why do you have to be such a scold? >> i'm not a scold.

i like him a lot. represents a problem millions upon millions of americans are facing. >> what, that he's a republicans. >> watching that sound bite or anything else that it is an impossible journey to take the road back from obesity and that he will do it, but it will -- it will be a very, very long haul. >> you have a good friend that's doing it. >> lost 75 pounds together. >> writing a book together. it's amazing what she has gone through to get there. >> it's tough. >> and i wouldn't even begin to judge him, and quite frankly, in terms of his ability to do office, take a look at what he's done and make your decision. >> yeah. >> i don't get it. >> really? >> what am i missing, mark mckinnon? >> modern culture. he ate a doughnut on "letterman." >> all the news stories, got to ask mark mckinnon the story. so barack obama, he'll sign like some regulation that will say that a federal agent can go pick

up a tumbleweed off the side of the road in a deserted road somewhere in middle america and republicans will stream to the floor and they will scream tonight, freedom was destroyed. tonight -- how many times have you heard that? barack obama has destroyed freedom. tonight, you know, barack obama has destroyed -- tonight freedom died. that's what we always hear from these republicans in the house and here you have something truly chilling. here you have the united states government we can kill you, american citizen. you have no constitutional right to a jury by your peers. you have no constitutional right even to -- to probable cause or to due process. you have no right to a lawyer. you have no right to counsel. you have no right to anything.

if we suspect you, just suspect you without evidence that you were thinking about committing an act against the united states of america, we can kill you. >> yeah. >> and we have -- there are no checks and there are no balances. we can kill you. we can pick you out of a list and drop a bomb on you, and not only can we kill you, we can then kill your 16-year-old son who is not even affiliated with al qaeda, and then we can blame it on the father for us having to kill the son. now that seems to me to be something republicans might -- might perhaps be concerned about. go to the floor about and talk about, and they talk about all these other lunatic, insane things where they say freedom is dying tonight. no, this is a great example of where the constitution is being stretched well beyond its limits. >> forget republicans. how about liberals and democrats? i mean, can you imagine if george w. bush had proposed this idea. >> of course. >> that's obvious. >> i'm a little contrarian on

this with you. i agree with the policy. i think it's a good idea >> you think it's okay to kill americans without probable cause? you think it's a good idea. >> thinking about the threats against us and the machiavellian plots, i'm willing to err on the side of giving a little bit of latitudes. >> this kid this, 16-year-old kid goes out to a restaurant and he gets killed. >> i understand. >> because of his father. >> i'm sure i'm in the minority at the stable. >> that causes you no concern? >> as i said. >> constitutionally. >> really? >> i err on giving the government latitude. >> really. >> we have kathy kay with us from washington, didn't get to do the intro so i didn't know. >> good morning, mika. >> how are you doing? >> you want to chime in on drones. are you with mark mckinnon? >> i think, you know, there has to be a lot more open discussion. we tried to raise a couple years ago, roy blunt tried to raise it

in the pettus hearings and this was knocked down by dianne feinstein, an issue of national intelligence. now it's out there so much and the secrecy element has gone and there has to be a real discussion, about the constitutionality, particularly when it comes to american citizens, but also the wider ramifications of whether this is actually serving our national security cause. while you're taking out some al qaeda leaders, you know, you're causing huge amount of resentments in some of these areas and possibly fueling the next generation of militants in places like yemen, the pakistani borders, if we extend it into somalia or even into mali, a whole lot of people who are going to feel extremely angry about missiles raining doulg down out of the sky and taking out people not associated with terrorism. there's an imam who spoke out against al qaeda. al qaeda operatives came to speak to him and as they were speaking under a tree, in fact to threaten him, and has we speaking out under a tree missiles came down and took him

out. what does that do in that community in terms of what america is dork anger towards america and the fueling of more people who feel they want to join the cause of jihad. >> the probable cause, now, is and it really is, if you're a man between certain ages and you are within the proximity of members who are suspected to be members of al qaeda, you are presumed guilty and they kill you. you're in the kill zone. >> have to be an imminent threat. >> you're presumed to be that. >> yeah. >> you know, the real of law here, katty and i always joke about losing the colonies. >> not happy. >> still mad. >> i don't think she's as grateful that she should be that we've allowed her to come back. >> exactly. >> one of the reasons why we broke away from her crowd was -- >> yeah. >> was that there were -- >> i'm struggling with this one. >> that the rule of law could

not simple police be in the hands of a king and could not be arbitrarily applied and that's precisely what this is, in the hands of an american king. >> an american king who actually gets the list of people who he decides who should be killed and who should not be killed and the "new york times" reports it. he goes down that list, and -- and there's so many things that are chilling here. i do -- do got to say, mika, again to follow up on what mark mckinnon said. this is one of those times you can't even say if george bush were doing this, because if george bush were doing this, everything that was going on in washington, d.c. would stop today. >> yes. >> there would be congressional hearings called. there would be articles of impeachment. all of washington, all of manhattan, the entire press corps would stop and focus its attention on this unprecedented overreach, constitutional overreach. >> i think some of it will come out in the brennan testimony,

and that should be very, very interesting. >> yeah. >> we made the point yesterday if this was happening in the bush administration people would be going crazy sort of in the echo chamber, but i do think when you think through the debate on this, and the debate you and i would have on this we would end up where we were on the debate about torture where we both evolve a little bit because we both love this country and both want to respect the moral values that it's formed upon and we also want our children to be safe. >> right. >> i mean, i think the debate would sound the same. >> it's a balancing act. i am surprised, and willie, let me bring you in here because we went through this a lot talking about enhanced interrogation techniques, and pretty soon even sleep deprivation and things that are done to u.s. soldiers in basic training are started to be defined as torture so i'm going to say enhanced interrogation techniques, i never could have imagined under george w. bush and dick cheney's

leadership that it would devolve this far. as i said, i was upset after reading the "new york times" article about how long padilla had been incarcerated without seeing an american lawyer. i mean, some things just aren't right and this just doesn't seem to be right. >> well, i said it yesterday and i'll say it again. i have a big problem will people being held at guantanamo bay without charge and for years and a decade, but i have a bigger problem with people who are being killed without charge in the field of battle, so if you're outraged about enhanced interrogation, you should really be outraged about someone being killed on the spot of suspicion of being a terrorist. a lot is a semantic question. if you read the word memo, the word imminent is used a lot. what does that mean? and also senior operative.

when we hear them come down, coming across the a.p. wire, we need to use more scrutiny and ask what does it mean that you guy you killed is a senior al qaeda operative? how do we know he's senior, an operative, an al qaeda? there's more questions that need to be asked. >> holding somebody at gitmo without charges, that's one level here, and you kill somebody without probable cause or evidence, that's right there, and then you make it an american citizen who is protected by the united states constitution. jon meacham, and suddenly that raises it to an entirely new level, and the u.s. government can decide which american citizens it's going to kill without probable cause. >> right. >> that is frightening. >> and, of course, the next step is the killing starts taking place on american soil. >> sure. >> we're not far from that. >> i think -- i think i said this yesterday. i think this is ultimate

manifestation of this blending of law enforcement and warfare that was thrust upon us by the attacks of september 11th, 10, 12 years ago, and it's -- they are now so intertwined it's almost impossible to pull them back apart, and one thing i think we have to be wary of is the history of executive power in the country bounces from one extreme to the other. we almost always overreact. so you don't want to get too much oversight and too complex about it because presidents know, you know, there is -- there's a need to be able to strike, but i would love to hear what the debate on this was. >> and also, i'm going to get to a couple more stories before we go to break. how history will look at this will be so interesting. >> not good. >> might be the bush administration policies from wire tapping, to gitmo, to torture that led to information that led to what's happening

here. i mean, it all will be related at some point, and the debate will be completely muddled, and it's the debate we were having before president obama went into office. everything that you predicted has come to pass and mohr. >> and more, exactly. >> other news. a new government report predicts the budget deficit will drop below $1 trillion for the first time during the obama presidency. the congressional budget office assumes spending cuts going into effect march 1st says the government will run a deficit of $845 billion this year compared to last year's $1.1 trillion shortfall but the cbo's ten-year outlook predicts those improvements will not last t.warns that an aging population will drive up entitlement spending and rising interest rates will put the debt at unsustainable levels. if current laws remain in place, debt by 2023, ten years from now, will equal 77% of gdp. that's roughly double the 39

boston average seen over the past 40 years. and president obama is asking lawmakers to take quick action as a march 1st deadline approaches that will trigger deep spending cuts. the "new york times" writes this morning that mr. observe ma, who missed a deadline this week to submit his annual budget to congress, acknowledged on tuesday that a broad deficit agreement is unlikely to be reached by the march deadline. he provided no details about the tens of billions of dollars in spending cuts and tax adjustments that he wants congress to pass quickly. more specifics could come when he delivers his state of the union address next tuesday. with nearly $1 trillion of domestic and defense spending hanging in the balance, the president says the impacts are already being felt. >> they are never -- there are never -- >> not going to run it. >> there are never specific spending cuts. democrats never provide specific spending cuts. democrats -- alex, i'm just curious, how long has it been since democrats have passed a

budget in the senate, watch this? >> 1,379 days. >> where the full screen? thought we had a full screen. >> since before the ipad. >> since before the ipad, exactly, and the labels, non-partisan group, of course, has this no budget. >> no pay signed into law by the president, for this particular bridge on the debt ceiling but need to apply it to the broader budget in the appropriations process. >> the thing is, it's just democrats haven't produced a budget in the senate. they haven't voted for any of the president's own budgets, full screen out. >> you were in congress. budget sets policy, right, so if you don't have a budget, you don't have policy? >> that's what i don't understand. you get there in january and you get sworn in. you know what the first four months are, bat many over what's going to be in the budget because you know when that budget falls in april, that's going to define who you are as a party. >> right. >> who you are as a congress, and who i am as an individual member, whether i vote for that

budget or vote against that budget. the fact that harry reid's senate and that harry reid himself has gotten in the way of a former really good budget chairman not passing a budget is shameful, and now you have the president saying, well, i'm against the sequester cuts. well, objection great. what are you going to replace them with? i don't know. no specifics. they never give specifics. >> so i -- i don't know because i was working on my column and talking to a couple different people in the white house yesterday and they were talking about the president's statement yesterday, and he is saying to republicans come meet with him, any time. they can come right now, and he will work on a deal. it can be a smaller deal if we can't make the sequestration deadline and it can involve spending and revenue and a mix and that they haven't taken their toys and walked away. they have offered $400 billion in health care cuts and other things. if the republicans have other

ideas, come on over to the white house, put them on the table. let's make a small deal, if we can't get to a big deal but we'd like to get to a big deal. >> coming back, is the white house justified in acting as judge, jury and executioner in its drone program? we'll speak to a law professor at george washington law school steven salsburg about the legality of killing americans along but first a check on the forecast. >> mika, looking at a very difficult forecast, one of the first most important winter storm area forecasts up into areas of new england. let me pull the curtain back to tell you what i'm looking and what trends we could be seeing in the days ahead. 48 hours away from the snow event. still time to tweet this. right now the moisture is down here in texas and it will combine into the northwest today. those two elements will meet on the eastern seaboard, a former nor'easter. this is the one that really got my attention when i walked into work this morning. this is what we call the european model and this all of a

sudden really blew the storm up into a monster, historic type storm with snowfall totals one to two feet, widespread from western forces of new york state right through central new england including for the first time new york city. that's just one of our computers. we have many of these computers that spit out this information. just to let you know, one of our more reliable american models showing new york city with one inch. it's a little bit warmer in southern new england. it makes it more rain than snow, so these are the little intricate details we'll be tweaking in the days ahead. bottom line, all of our computer models, even the shorter-term forecast called the nam model shows the potential for a major snow storm. we know it's going to be a big storm. central new england is the target, guaranteed heavy snow. southern new england to new york city, friday, looks like it could be sleet, rain, snow. if it's all snow a blockbuster snow. mixing with rain and sleet, of course, those totals come down. the storm located today down in texas, and we have to watch it trek across to the east coast by the time we get to friday morning.

bottom line, travel in new england, flying especially, logan, providence, hartford down to new york city, could be very difficult on friday. d.c., i don't really see any scenario where you get snow out of this. it looks like we'll continue to watch the green grass as we go throughout february. you're watching "morning joe" brewed by starbucks. come on, nowadays lots of people go by themselves. no they don't. hey son. have fun tonight. ♪ ♪ back against the wall ♪ ain't nothin to me ♪ ain't nothin to me [ crowd murmurs ] hey! ♪ [ howls ] ♪

with multiple lacerations to the wing and a fractured beak. surgery was successful, but he will be in a cast until it is fully healed, possibly several months. so, if the duck isn't able to work, how will he pay for his living expenses? aflac. like his rent and car payments? aflac. what about gas and groceries? aflac. cell phone? aflac, but i doubt he'll be using his phone for quite a while cause like i said, he has a fractured beak. [ male announcer ] send the aflac duck a get-well card at getwellduck.com.

we conduct those strikes because they are necessary to mitigate ongoing actual threats, to stop plots, prevent future attacks and, again, save

american lives. these strikes are legal. they are ethical and they are wise. >> one of the things i want to make sure that everybody understands is that our primary concern is to keep the american people safe, but to do so in a way that's consistent with our laws and consistent with our values. we say that we only take these kinds of actions when there's an imminent threat, when capture is not feasible and when we are confident that we're doing so in a way that's consistent with federal and international law. >> 24 past the hour. top administration officials yesterday insisting the white house policy on the u.s. drones, killing americans abroad, believe to be affiliated with al qaeda is consistent with the constitution. joining us now from washington professor of law -- >> oh, by the way, mika, do you know why they said it's consistent with the constitution? >> why? >> because it was. >> well, why -- basically it was the constitutional equivalent

that the bible says it, i believe it says it. >> professor of law at george washington university steven saltzburg joins the conversation. why don't we ask him. >> much more wiser. thanks so much for being with us. let me just ask you what did you make of the administration's justification of this drone policy targeting and killing american citizens? >> well, it's an interesting memorandum. it tries to combine united states law, international law and the law of war, and i think it's persuasive in part, and it raises a host questions that will be debated for a long time. i mean, clearly the most controversial part of this memorandum is this. i mean, everybody i think agrees that if -- if somebody were loading an airplane with a bomb ready to drop it on a city in the united states, everybody would say stop that airplane, and it wouldn't really matter whether it was being piloted by an american or somebody from any

other country. that would be an imminent threat, but this memorandum says that the united states reserves the right to kill an american who it identifies as a high level al qaeda operative or someone associated -- an associated force of al qaeda who poses an imminent threat but then defines imminent threat as being nothing that's imminent at all. >> that is a curious part of the memorandum. i'm curious what parts do you believe -- you said there are parts that are persuasive. what parts do you think is the most persuasive here? >> the law of self-defense using the airplane example. everyone agrees if the country is about to be attacked, that the country has a right to defend itself. >> yeah. >> and, unfortunately, if americans happen to be part of the attack force, it's treason, but they don't get protection above that and which the law of war would give anybody else. memorandum though goes beyond that kind of immediate sense of

self-defense to try to deal with something we've never dealt with in history before was a non-state actor like al qaeda, affiliated groups, and the question of what do you do about them when they spread out throughout many parts of the world and they apparently still target the united states and united states citizens. >> you know, there's a long history, jon meacham of presidents going well beyond the bounds what appears to be written in the constitution from john adams, to abraham lincoln, of course, suspending habeus korus to woodrow wilson and fdr and george w. bush and now president obama. we just do this, don't we? >> presidents tend to do what they want to do and find post-facto reasoning for it. jefferson argued that the duty of the chief magistrate is a strict line of the law but that's not the highest duty, that the survival of the country is. i wanted to ask the professor,

if i could, is the constitutional basis for the memo the commander in chief clause? >> it is the -- it is the commander in chief clause, and tied in with, you know, well-developed concepts of international law and that is the right of nations to defend themselves against attack and to engage in self-defense before the attack occurs. >> so, as we've been debating this, and i wonder, joe, what you're thinking because we've been through debates like this before on issues of torture and gitmo and other areas where you feel like the letters of the law are being stretched and perhaps even, you know, to the point of popping, but what's potentially persuasive here maybe the same type of mental gymnastics you have to do to justify in your mind to gitmo or torture. >> right, except the difference here obviously, professor, is the fact that we're dealing with american citizens.

as i've said before over the past few days, it's one thing if we are going out and seizing who we believe to be enemy combatants and throwing hem into gitmo and keeping them there for a long time, that's one standard, but it would seem that the standard would be raised considerably when you start talking about an american citizen, whether it's padilla or whether it's now these americans who are being killed in drone strikes. >> well, i think you're right about that, and the memorandum is very careful. it basically limits itself to an analysis of what constitutional protections are provided to american citizens that might not be provided to others and then concludes that neither the fourth amendment, the right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures or the fifth amendment, the right to have your life protected, neither of those provisions prevents the president and the executive branch from protecting the united states from an imminent threat. as i say, the real question here is what qualifies as an imminent threat that would warrant taking a life without any kind of

proceeding or any kind of review by anybody else? >> and professor, the biggest problem is, again, you talk about the law of self-defense, but then you talk about this imminent threat is defined down to something that's just not imminent, and then you couple that with the fact that we are killing the 16-year-old sons of suspects, and then you couple with that the president of the united states, as the "new york times" reported this past summer, actually going down a kill list and selecting people to target. my god, i -- i suspect you've been doing this for quite some time. i'm sure you could have never imagined the united states getting to this point even ten years ago. >> i think that's true. one of the dangers i think in the debate that's going on right now is that it's all well and good to think about killing americans, but does it really matter whether it's an american or a british citizen, french or

german if we're authorizing someone to kill them because we think they are part of a group that might attack us? >> i mean, does it matter constitutionally? >> great point. >> it does -- we give americans more protection than we give non-citizens under certain parts of the constitution, but when we're dealing with lethal force, it seems to me that we ought to worry about everybody that we're targeting. >> yes, we should. >> everybody we're killing, whether american or not. >> yes, we should, mark mckinnon. >> jon was talking it's a post-facto rationale but this is pre-facto. imagine a circumstance that this would be deployed by an american president, it would be a circumstance that's hardly even imagined so i say give -- give them that -- that latitude. >> well, they have it. >> good. i'm glad they do. >> but can there be -- a potential judicial challenge

here? could there be a case brought? >> there always could be a case brought. can it win? i don't think so. i think when it comes to this area courts will definitely defer to the executive branch. >> all right. well, i believe the family of the 16-year-old boy who was killed actually are bringing a lawsuit. i don't know that it's a constitutional challenge. probably a civil suit. >> professor stephen saltzburg, thanks so much for coming on the though. >> thank you, prove certificate sore, appreciate it. >> former president clinton says of all the laws passed while in office there's still one that gets the most praise. we'll tell you what that law is and talk about its on going conversation with joe conason and alexis herman next on "morning joe."

it took eight years and two vetoes to make this legislation the law of the land. now, millions of our people will no longer have to choose between their jobs and their families. the law guarantees the right of up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave per year when it's urgently needed at home to care for a newborn child or an ill family member. >> signing one of your favorite

bills. >> sure. >> this was like big for women. >> the family and medical leave act into law. that was 20 years ago yesterday. and president clinton reflected on the anniversary in politico writing in part this. 20 years ago yesterday, barely more than two weeks into my presidency, i stood in the white house rose garden to sign the family and medical leave act which provided millions of americans with the opportunity to take time off to care for a new child or sick relative. it was then and remains today the embodiment of my governing philosophy of empowerment through opportunity and responsibility. to this day, i receive more thanks from citizens for the fmla than any other single piece of legislation i signed into law. and joining us now to discuss the legacy of this law, the editor-in-chief of nationalmemo.com joe conasoan and in washington, d.c. former secretary of labor for the clinton administration, might have had something to do with it

herself, alexis herman. alex alexis, welcome to the conversation. good to have you. >> good to be with you. >> so this is, this was landmark legislation. it was an incredible, i think, rite of passage for women and men. alexis, what do you make 20 years later as to how well society and the business community has caught up with the law? >> i think society, working families, the business opportunity has not only caught up but appreciates the law. we now know from surveys from businesses, for instance, that it has helped with productivity. it's helped with morale, and it has helped to reduce turnover. so i luke to think of it as president clinton always said, it's when our values really did catch up with the times. >> you know, mika, this is especially an important law, as you know, for women because you have women who were the care-givers. >> right. >> whether it's for children who may be sick or whether it's for the elderly, you know. it's usually not us guys that are going in to take care of our

parents. it's the women. so this really seems to be a piece of legislation you'd strongly support. >> yes, and i think much more needs to be done, and actually before we get to joe. alexis, i'd like to ask you where do you think we ought to go from here in terms of creating a situation and a society in which women can have equal access to their work while still maintaining their responsibilities at home? >> i think what's important here, mika, is to remember the values that really guided the initial legislation, when women were coming into the workforce in increasing numbers, but the big difference was working mothers and mothers who were working during their pregnancy. that was very different for us. >> yeah. >> and now 70% of mothers are doing that, so the real issue now is access to family and medical leave, and it's also about whether or not there can be paid leave as a part of it. it's also a question i think as this administration, the obama

administration has done, of expanding it to include wounded soldiers and looking at ways that we can support even more veterans, so in the same way that president clinton had to look at the times when we were in office, we have to examine these new times when the reality is people are working longer and harder, and it's difficult to access the law so we need to ask ourselves what we can do differently. >> 20-year anniversary of fmla, can you believe that 1993 seems like just yesterday? why do you think this law is so important? >> the reason president clinton has people tell him it's appreciated, 100 million families have used it, 14,000 in 2011. this is a law that affect all strata of american society. the problem we have and mika has written about this in national memo is we're far behind other

countries in this. far behind when it was passed and far behind the benefits -- >> how is in a? how are we behind? >> other countries have paid leave. they have paid leave for dads as well as moms when a pregnancy is -- a baby is born. >> check out sweden. >> yes. >> good lord. >> but all the advanced countries, countries in the oecd and studies i wrote about in national memo, they have much more progressive policies than we do, and they benefit it. their people benefit from it. this was a great advance that the president signed into law and that president obama has enhanced, especially for military families which is great. >> yeah. >> but there needs to be more done. >> you know, there's also the reality of this, too, mika, that you can hug up sweden and other countries. there's just a cultural divide between the united states and a lot of european countries. >> yeah. >> where i know there are women out there especially that want to take unpaid leave, but in

the -- in the work environment they feel like they may get punished for doing that, and, i mean, could you imagine taking 12 weeks off from work? >> no. >> because what would happen. there's still a stigma even though it's the law of the land. is there not a stigma? >> there's still a lot of workplaces that aren't covered. the compromises that were made to pass the law in 1993. >> like which ones? >> ones with less than 50 employees, fewer than 50 employees so a woman who works in a place like that, a lot of leave is taken for personal sick leave, that's the biggest number of people who take family and medical leave now. they are not covered, so they -- they don't have a choice. i mean, unless the employer is good enough to say, yes, you can do this, they are not protected. >> so i think the government and businesses, employers are really working to -- i see an effort to try and deal with the very complex issues of trying to keep

women working. >> right. >> i think women are stepping up. alexis, i'll get to you in a second, but i -- i think men need to step up as well at home, and this is where our society has to do something on its own. >> what? >> and you were making fun of yourself. >> hold on. i'm about to compliment you. >> need me to step up at home? >> they actually need to be more like you. you're always doing errands. always doing chores. you bring your daughter home from school. you take your son for his haircut. >> there you go. >> every time i'm talking to joe, he's out doing the errands with the kids and driving around late at night working at home. >> progressive dad. >> i'm a progressive dad. >> i'm a mr. mom. >> my husband does the same way. more men need to step up and share chores at home and share duties equally and put dinner on the table. >> you should see my aapron, by

the way. >> unbelievable what women do at home versus what men do and sheryl sanberg and i was talking don't marry someone who won't help, not help, join in this partnership. >> women still do about twice as much, but this is helping. >> i think that's very true. that's very true. mika, i'm glad to hear you say that because it really is still about women doing the majority of the work, and this is the family and medical leave act, and men have a critical row to play increasingly so, and i'm glad to hear joe is such a role model. >> he is. >> maybe he can be the spokesperson for the next leg of the family medical leave act. >> maybe he could. >> but the point for most families is that men aren't expected to do things and if you get a guy, alexis, who leaves the office to go to like a soccer game, everyone is like oh, look at that great daddy. >> it's okay, right. >> no, i don't think so. >> and what we have to do increasingly is make it okay to

have the conversation, and that's what the family and medical leave act did in the beginning about succeeding at work and home, but now we've got to bring men into it even more. and if we do that, guess what? this congress i think will act on. >> all right. >> what we need to do to expand it. >> thank you for coming on the show. >> my pleasure. >> come soeon the set with us. joe conason, thank you as well. the post office is hemorrhaging money and now it's making some change. we'll get to that next.

it's time now for business before the bell with cnbc's

brian schactman. brian. >> what you got? >> hi, guys. the stock market is going to start with a lower open state but a few business stories i want to talk about, dell going pride of for $24 billion led by michael dell taking it back private after 25 years of being public. microsoft contributing on the deal. "wall street journal" saying it's the unofficial end of the pc era. i have to tell you i thought that happened when apple came out with the ipad. u.s. postal service getting rid of saturday delivery. as we know, the postal service lost 5 billion last year. they say this will save 2 billion. post offices will still be open. package delivery will still happen. mail delivery is going down but the package business is going up. it won't take effect from six months from now to give people the opportunity to get ready for it. so i guess -- i used to like the saturday mail. finally, disney, i don't know if you saw this, guys, but they basically said they are going to do spinoff "star wars" movies based on the characters, and some people are saying they

might do a yoda movie but i personal want to see the back story on chewibacca's life. will they have it subtitles? something all "star wars" roubu want to know. two things fathers can pass along to their sons, baseball and "star wars" and i'm trying to pass both of them >> so be it, jedi. >> and a willingness to do errands. >> yeah, mika. what's the percentage that makes it acceptable for a husband in terms of household terms? i do laundry, dishes and i make sandwiches at night when i can, but i definitely -- it's not 50/50 so in your world to get in your good graces can it be 60/40, 65/35. >> there has to be times when it has to be 60/40 slanted towards the woman to make up for just generations of ridiculous amounts. i'll tell you this much. >> i'm not going to do dish washing reparations for the sins of my father.

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we mark today not a victory of party or the accomplishments of an individual but the triumph of an idea, the idea that all men are created equal so that i

can say to you today that i am a son of virginia. >> i'm meteorologist bill karins with your business travel forecast. a lot of fog early today down along the give. a lot of warm air and moisture surging up through texas and louisiana. fog and also rain and even some thunderstorms from san antonio. eventually this is the moisture that will move tomorrow into the southeast with heavy rain, and the potential for this to be a nor'easter with snow in new england on friday. more details later. more details later. consider tragically, their buy got sacked by blackouts. but it's our tradition! that's roughing the card holder. but with the capital one venture card you get double miles you can actually use.

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